second-guessing

verb

present participle of second-guess
1
as in outguessing

Related Words

Relevance
2
as in reasoning

Related Words

Dissimilar Words

Example Sentences

Recent Examples of Synonyms for second-guessing
  1. balking
  2. reasoning
  3. overreaching
  4. analyzing
  5. outmaneuvering
  6. reviewing
  7. outsmarting
  8. exploring
Verb
  • Many residents are balking at that timing and at Ryan’s lawsuit against Killingly’s wetlands board for rejecting the first version of the plan on July 6.
    — Don Stacom, Hartford Courant, 6 Aug. 2026
  • Others were less sympathetic, balking at Crespi’s counter-offer and stating that Crespi’s employment must be discussed publicly because the DDA is a public agency beholden to the state’s Sunshine Law.
    — Tess Riski August 5, Miami Herald, 5 Aug. 2026
Definition of balking
Verb
  • Engineers like me hold several spatial relationships in their minds at once, reasoning about where things sit relative to one another across scales ranging from a city block to a whole watershed.
    — Hatim Sharif, The Conversation, 6 Aug. 2026
  • This line of attack came from Mythos reasoning that the repository maintainer could be an AI coding agent such as Claude Code.
    — Jeremy Hsu, ArsTechnica, 5 Aug. 2026
Definition of reasoning
Verb
  • The grand jury subpoena was filed in April and was almost immediately met with resistance from Fulton County officials, who argued the request was overreaching and came from baseless claims of election fraud six years ago.
    — Irene Wright, USA Today, 8 July 2026
  • In France, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally party has opportunistically seized on air-conditioning, portraying it as an urgent quality-of-life issue that moralizing environmentalists and overreaching technocrats have ignored.
    — Thomas Chatterton Williams, The Atlantic, 28 June 2026
Definition of overreaching
Verb
  • Hofstadter is brilliant at analyzing types that feel quite familiar to us today—the crusading urban progressive, the small-town conspiracy theorist.
    — Emma Sarappo, The Atlantic, 14 Aug. 2026
  • While designers and merchants remain in control of strategic decisions, AI enhances their expertise by analyzing demand signals, surfacing insights and recommending actions that humans can evaluate.
    — Arthur Zaczkiewicz, Footwear News, 13 Aug. 2026
Definition of analyzing
Verb
  • May built one of the most dominant teams in Big Ten history by outmaneuvering his peers in the transfer portal.
    — Austin Meek, New York Times, 30 June 2026
  • Two generals agreed with Ashley's characterization, stressing the view that on the front lines, Ukraine was outmaneuvering Russia.
    — Aidan Stretch, CBS News, 9 June 2026
Definition of outmaneuvering
Verb
  • There had been a check and balance to the power of board dismissal, with the SEC reviewing exclusion decisions.
    — Erik Sherman, Forbes.com, 15 Aug. 2026
  • While reviewing Clancy’s cellphone records, her defense attorney pointed to multiple internet searches related to caring for and playing with children, including queries about trampolines and kids’ movies.
    — Nicki Brown, CNN Money, 14 Aug. 2026
Definition of reviewing
Verb
  • The problem, according to Hinton, is that humans will no longer be able to rely on outsmarting super-intelligent AI models.
    — Matt Egan, CNN Money, 6 Aug. 2026
  • The Fan, the season-long unsub obsessed with one-upping and outsmarting his idol.
    — Joyce Eng, Entertainment Weekly, 23 July 2026
Definition of outsmarting
Verb
  • Renaissance Reno Downtown Hotel & Spa, located along the Truckee River, offers an ideal base for exploring both the city and surrounding mountains.
    — Roger Sands, Forbes.com, 10 Aug. 2026
  • Hudson, a former tackle, seems to have stuck on the interior, where the Patriots are still exploring ways to add depth.
    — Andrew Callahan, Boston Herald, 10 Aug. 2026
Definition of exploring
Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Browse Nearby Words

second-guesses
second-guessing
secondhand
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Cite this Entry

“Second-guessing.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/second-guessing. Accessed 17 Aug. 2026.

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